Just as McDonald’s resturants successfully introduced themselves into food-conscious Europe, another American-derived invasive species could be entering and killing off the native fauna.

At a briefing for the launch of the Ford Kuga (aka our Escape), Ford’s Alex Gallagher told Just-Auto that SUV sales are far outpacing sales of D-Segment cars, or what we call mid-size cars in North America. Europe’s D-segment includes not just sedans, but also hatchback and wagon variants as well.

Over the last 5 years, sales of SUVs have more than doubled, to 250,000 units annually, eclipsing D-segment sales for the first time last month. Despite SUVs being primarily thought of as an American product, Gallagher cites the Nissan Qashqai and Juke  as the driving force behind the switch to SUVs. Last month, the Qashqai and Juke ranked 5th and 9th respectively in a top 10 list dominated by small B-segment hatchbacks. In 2012, the 6th place Qashqai outsold the 13th place Vauxhall Insignia (the top selling D-segment car) by roughly 13,000 units, and outsold the Ford Mondeo and VW Passat (the second and third place D-segment cars) by a 2:1 ratio.

While SUVs were once derided as vehicles for farmers, mobsters or over-indulged housewives (at one time being labeled “Chelsea tractors, after the tony London neighborhood) the newest crop of SUVs are more in the dreaded crossover template than anything else. Despite the accepted binary dynamic whereby wagons= good and crossovers=bad, the much maligned two-box vehicles have won high praise from both critics and consumers on the continent. Even Chris Harris went ga-ga for the Dacia Duster, praising it for its simplicity and calling it “the most significant new motorcar launched in the past decade“.

Whenever we post about a Volkswagen, comments about reliability (or, more specifically, the lack of it) inevitably follow. So few will be surprised that, with the latest update to TrueDelta’s car reliability stats, the 2012 Passat again received subpar marks. Though the big sedan’s score is better than earlier, it remains considerably worse than most other 2012s. Digging through the repair reports, a common cause emerges. Ignition coils aren’t failing. Nor are window regulators. Instead, the most common problem for these cars happens to be rattles.

VAG certainly knows how to engineer a car without bits that squeak and jiggle. The far more complex new A6 and A7 have had hardly any problems so far, rattles or otherwise. So what happened with the new Passat? Don’t quickly blame the new Chattanooga plant: the “hencho en Mexico” 2012 Jetta is also prone to rattle. (Mysteriously, the 2011 Jetta fares better.)

These updated reliability stats cover owner experiences through the end of June 2012 (scores elsewhere are about 14 months behind). Among recently redesigned cars, the Passat is the exception rather than the rule. In addition to the A6 and A7, the FIAT 500, Honda Civic, Honda CR-V, Hyundai Accent, Hyundai Veloster, and Subaru Impreza are all doing well so far. Initial data for the 2013 Mazda CX-5 suggest it will be joining them. The Ford Focus isn’t among the best, but “about average” is an improvement over Fords redesigned a year or two earlier (Taurus, Fiesta, Explorer).

TrueDelta will update its car reliability stats again in November. The more people participate, the more models we can cover and the more precise these stats will be.

To view the updated repair trips per year stats:

Car Reliability Survey results

Michael Karesh operates truedelta.com, a provider of car reliability and pricing information.

Sometimes it all comes together, doesn’t it — right before it all falls apart. Lightning in a bottle. Never as good before, never to be equaled afterwards. Duane Allman crashes his motorcycle, the sunburst Les Paul yields to the “Les Paul SG”, the perfected Honda VFR800 Interceptor is replaced by something that looks like the Nostromo’s escape pod, the woman you desperately love goes desperately crazy and desperately calls your wife, that kind of stuff.

The family sedan, too, had its high-water mark, its ’59 ‘Burst, its At Fillmore East. The G.O.A.T. The Greatest Of All Time. Once in history, all the tides converged. The resulting car was fast, spacious, full-featured, affordable, safe, economical, gorgeous, desirable. Hmm. We’re missing one quality, aren’t we? We’ll get to that later.

Ladies and gentlemen, meet the G.O.A.T.: the 1998 Volkswagen Passat GLS 1.8t five-speed manual. Yes, I had one.

It was late 1997 and I was looking for a sedan to replace my soon-to-be-off-lease 1996 Taurus. My wife and I looked at pretty much everything under thirty grand, from the Camry XLE (couldn’t see myself driving a poverty-wedge Toyota, didn’t plan to own it long enough for the build quality to be an issue) to the Acura 2.5TL (apparently the result of one drunken Honda employee reminiscing about the original “aero” Audi 100 over a static-filled international phone line to another drunken Honda employee who wrote down the specs as gospel and then chose to make the dream come true using an Accord sans front clip). What I really wanted was an Audi A4, of course. Everybody wanted an Audi A4 in 1998. The car had appeared out of nowhere and simply blitzed the brainstems of the nation’s twentysomethings. The cars were so freakin’ cool that Audi was able to paint them in eye-watering shades of yellow and blue, call them “Cool Shades” in completely non-ironic fashion, and still watch ‘em fly out the door to young architects, recording engineers, and university professors.

The Passat, according to Car and Driver, was a long-wheelbase A4 with more room and even more impressive exterior design. Although VW would later on Pimp Ze Ride and create the unfortunately garish 2001 Passat from the same body shell, that doesn’t diminish the fact that an original ’98 Passat, complete with plain yellow side markers, remains probably the cleanest-looking sedan in modern history. There isn’t a single unnecessary line, flare, swoop, or crease on the thing. It’s perfectly proportioned and it slips through the air silently. It made the A4 look like it was trying too hard to justify its price premium.

The two cars shared the same base-model powertrain, too: the VW Group’s twenty-valve four-cylinder with light-pressure turbo. The mild 150-horsepower rating attached to this mill didn’t begin to describe how quick the car felt when compared to its competition. Having driven A4s equipped with this turbomotor and the optional V-6, I already knew that the silky thirty-valver was no faster in the real world than the 1.8t, and it cost seriously more money in both Audi and Volkswagen variants of the “B5″ platform.

The color rags were unanimous in their long-lead praises of the Passat, and at the time I didn’t understand just how little that meant, so we took a test drive in the bright-blue demo unit assigned to Midwestern Auto Group as soon as the car was available. The advance demand for the Passat meant that this particular car had been ridden more often than Pamela Des Barres, and in similarly careless fashion — as I recall, we got our shot in Week 2 of the Passat’s stay at the dealership and the car already had over 2500 miles on it. We weren’t in any way convinced. The interior didn’t look as nice as it had in C/D’s lovingly-lit promo photographs and the seats wobbled in their mountings as I attacked an on-ramp with what I believed to be a club racer’s worth of aggression. It even smelled weird.

A month’s worth of test drives in the Japanese competition, plus a brief visit to the BMW dealer to spec out a 318i, brought us back to VW. This time, there was an undriven unit available for us, in Royal Green. Three hours later, that car was in our driveway. Maybe it was the power of suggestion, maybe it was car-shopping ennui, maybe it was the prospect of paying $575 a month to drive a four-cylinder BMW with wheel covers, but the Passat absolutely convinced us on what Shalamar would call the second time around.

Immediately, we took the Passat all around the state: to the in-laws’ up in Cleveland, to the outlet malls and unusual restaurants, to Hocking Hills to enjoy a mostly ice-free winter romp down those infamous two-lanes. Everything about the car was even better than we’d hoped. The stereo was pretty good. All four seats were comfortable for the long haul. As noted above, it was silent on the freeway, which means a lot more to driver fatigue levels than most of us want to admit. We averaged well above thirty miles per gallon in mixed use, which seemed amazing given the ferocity with which I flogged the sleek sedan from every stoplight.

The Passat wasn’t just satisfying to drive; it was satisfying to have. It was forcefully tasteful, and when one is in one’s twenties that sort of thing matters. We pushed the Lexus ES300s and BMW E36es out of the left lane, laughing at their outmoded window glass and awkward proportions. There was simply nothing better out there. Anything available at the same price was pathetic; anything costing more was just wasteful. Our only concern was that we wouldn’t find anything nearly as good to replace it.

That turned out to be the case; about twenty-six months into our time with the Passat, I traded it for a 2000 Golf 1.8t GLS five-speed hatchback. The idea was that my wife would have a slightly smaller car to drive to work. The reality was that the Golf was worse at everything, including conserving fuel. The lady of the house wanted her Passat back. We went to look at the 2001 Passat, which as noted above was rather frightful-looking and cost considerably more for no good reason. Finally, I had a bit of a quarter-life crisis occasioned by the fact that I was nearly thirty years old and hadn’t yet purchased a new BMW, which is how we came to have a 2001 BMW 330i Sport five-speed in the driveway in the Golf’s place less than eight months after said Golf made its first appearance there. The BMW, Mrs. Baruth told me, “was pretty much as good as the Passat.” Since it had cost nearly forty-three thousand dollars against the Passat’s $21,495 or thereabouts — two to one! like Surf City for suburban strivers! — I didn’t take a lot of comfort in that mild approbation.

The Passat which replaced the “B5″ was very much the Gibson SG to the B5′s sunburst Lester, or perhaps “5150″ to the B5′s “1984″. It looked cheaper and cost more. Just like that, the best sedan in history was gone. Meanwhile, the remaining examples of that “best sedan” were busy showing their owners just how VW had been able to sell a car like that for a price like that. The interior bits rubbed shiny and then fell off. The electronics went maddeningly dark. The engines died with numbing regularity. Some of them even rusted. The ’98 Passat didn’t exactly deliver the hammer blow to the face of VW’s millennial renaissance — that task was easily accomplished by the “Emm Kay Eye Vee” Jettas with their list of failures that seemingly owed equal allegiance to Robert Bosch and Hieronymus Bosch — but they turned a lot of True Believers into Toyota Owners.

Five years after our Royal Green Passat wandered out of our lives, I drove my wife back to Midwestern Auto Group to take delivery of our new 2005 Phaeton. The sticker said something along the lines of eighty-one thousand dollars. This time, our comparison set had abandoned Camrys and Acuras for the W220 S-Class and the frowny-faced Siebener Bimmer. I insisted that she drive the car home — it was really a gift for her, for sticking with me through the hard times into the limitless paradise of our middle-class prosperity, ever after and forever. I didn’t know it at the time, but we were at our high point, too. We were the Allman Brothers, I was Duane, and I was about to go shopping for a motorcycle. We pulled out of the dealership’s massive underground garage and the sunlight flashbulbed the Phaeton’s spare-no-expense interior. The big V-8 purred and the seats adjusted to our whims in eighteen different ways while blowing cold air up the back of my Marol casual shirt. I was quite impressed with myself. “What do you think?” I asked her.

“It’s pretty nice. I mean, it’s really nice. It’s about as nice… as my Passat.”

Volkswagen is on track to have their best year in America since 1973 – and all it took was a revamped product lineup that got largely negative reviews from the automotive press.

Sales for the first half of 2012 are up 35 percent versus the same time-frame in 2011. June sales were up 34 percent versus 12 months ago. Sales of the Passat are at an all-time high, with the TDI accounting for 21 percent of the mix. Dealers apparently can’t get enough TDIs to fill demand, and VW is hoping to bring more of the engines from their plant in Poland to the Chattanooga, Tennessee factory. Year to date, sales of the Passat are up nearly 25,000% according to independent analyst Timothy Cain. Sales of the Jetta are also strong, capturing the 14th best-selling car spot in America so far, ahead of the Kia Optima and Chrysler 200. So much for being one of the biggest flops of 2011.

Hybrid or diesel? For peak fuel economy in a $30,000 midsize sedan you need one or the other. The Toyota Camry is the most efficient of the five available hybrids (until the 2013 Ford Fusion arrives). If you live in Europe, the diesel world is your oyster. In North America, you have one option for an oil-burning mid-size sedan, the Volkswagen Passat. Which would you pick?

Neither sedan’s design would have blazed any trails even a decade ago. But the Passat’s styling, both inside and out, is cleaner and more harmonious. Toyota’s designers can’t seem to step back far enough from the trees to envision a forest. The Camry Hybrid XLE’s interior, with some materials a little better and others a little worse than those in the Passat TDI SEL Premium, has too much going on stylistically. The upper doors halfheartedly attempt to flow into the instrument panel, while lacking the latter’s stitching. The “stitching” molded into the center stack trim is similarly counterproductive, as it actually cheapens the interior. Of course, many people (including the one I’m married to) don’t notice such things. Though both cars have seats trimmed in faux suede, and the Passat additionally includes faux timber, they’ll likely find the ambiance warmer inside the Camry.

Both interiors have been designed to maximize perceived room with fairly flat door panels that meet the instrument panel at a right angle. The previous-generation Camry’s interior, with curvier panels, feels much tighter. Both cars have broad, supportive front seats that provide little in the way of lateral support, though the Passat’s cushions are firmer and the Camry’s headrests jut forward to an uncomfortable degree. There’s plenty of room for adults in the back of the Camry. The Passat, with another inch of combined legroom that somehow seems like three inches, invites limo comparisons…until you notice that, unlike in the Toyota, there are no rear air vents.

Then there’s cargo hauling. Both cars are offered only as sedans. By working in shifts to compact the Camry’s hybrid bits, Toyota engineers bumped trunk volume 2.5 cubic feet, to 13.1. A worthwhile increase, but still not close to the Passat’s 15.9. Both trunks can be expanded by folding the rear seat, but you only have a mail slot on the right side in the Camry.

Though the new Camry Hybrid is more firmly suspended than the previous one, and the Americanized Passat is softer than the typical German sedan, the two cars haven’t met in the middle. The Camry remains a considerably softer, cushier, quieter car, with some float and bobble through rough curves, while the Passat provides more nuanced feedback (through the seat of the pants much more than the electrically assisted steering) and has more tightly controlled body motions. Your ears will only report that the VW is a diesel at idle, and then only if you’re paying attention. The additional noise inside its cabin mostly comes from the wind and the road.

Unlike some smaller fuel sippers, both cars have more than enough power for scooting about the ‘burbs or popping onto the freeway. Both feel torquey at low-to-moderate engine speeds, the Camry because of the assist provided by its electric motor, the Passat because it’s a diesel. With far more peak horsepower, 200 vs. 140, the Camry Hybrid’s powertrain can get you to sixty sooner. But it’s not a joy to wind out, so this advantage isn’t large in the real world. If you have a lead foot, neither car is your best bet.

The EPA MPG numbers—43 city, 39 highway for the Camry and 30 city, 40 highway for the Passat—rightly suggest that the two cars excel in different types of driving. But the EPA shortchanges both cars. Judging from its trip computer (which I initially doubted, but owners report similar numbers), the Passat TDI can manage high 30s in suburban driving and low 50s on the highway without too much effort. In straight highway driving, the Camry cannot match it, checking in around 45. A hybrid’s additional fuel efficiency is derived from its ability to recoup energy while decelerating. If there’s no deceleration, the hybrid powertrain not only provides no benefit but, through its additional mass, actually becomes a disadvantage. Off the highway the tables are turned. The more stops per mile, the better the Camry becomes, especially if you factor in the higher cost per gallon of diesel.

It also helps if one does not drive the Camry “normally.” My wife managed 38 miles-per-gallon in the Camry Hybrid, about the same as I observed in the Passat TDI when driving with the flow of traffic. But when I was behind the wheel, the trip computer regularly reported averages in the low 50s and as high as 63 on my standard suburban route. The hybrid’s operation makes a very casual driving style feel “right,” and I personally enjoy the experience. But many people simply don’t want to drive with a light enough foot to achieve these numbers. For them, the TDI is the better way to go, as its efficiency varies much less with driving style.

Load both cars up, and the Camry stickers for a couple grand more, $35,330 vs. $33,090. But, based on the car price comparison tool, the Toyota includes about $900 in additional features, cutting the difference to $1,300. Also note that Toyota dealers enjoy wider margins. Compare invoices, and the VW has only a $554 advantage before adjusting for feature differences, and a $300 disadvantage afterwards. Since invoice prices often better reflect what people actually pay, price isn’t likely to be the deciding factor between these two cars.

Consumers are likely to decide between the two based on styling, ride, handling, amenities, driving conditions, driving style, and the reputation of each brand. After a rough start, the 2012 Passat has improved so that it’s not far from the average in TrueDelta’s car reliability survey, but it’s very early. If you had to choose between the two, which would you buy?

Camry Hybrid provided with fuel and insurance by Toyota.

Passat TDI provided by Dan Kelley, Suburban VW in Farmington Hills, MI, 248-741-7903

Michael Karesh operates TrueDelta, an online source of automotive pricing and reliability data.

Volkswagen purists rejoice; here’s a European Passat wagon with a 2.0L diesel, a DSG gearbox, all-wheel drive and the prestige of not being an American-built VW.

The AllTrack is officially a concept for our purposes, but VW will sell you one if you live in the Schengen Zone. Look for an American version to have a gasoline option as well as the 140 horsepower TDI motor. The AllTrack would conceivably be a strong rival to the Subaru Outback while also helping VW out with the big gaping crossover hole in their lineup. I wonder if they’ll offer it with a manual?

The biggest sticking point here seems to be that the AllTrack is ostensibly built in Europe, off of a car that isn’t sold here. Will it be imported or will Chattanooga somehow be retrofitted to build a unique model?

Thanks to AutoGuide.com for the photos

Volkswagen will apparently debut a “concept” version of the Passat Alltrack, a European model that shares little with our Americanized Passat sedan.

Featuring 4Motion all-wheel drive, a 2.0L TDI making 140 horsepower and 236 lb-ft of torque and a6-speed DSG gearbox, the Alltrack is like a German Subaru Outback, but with a much desired diesel engine. There’s even a hill descent control feature. Sadly, there is no manual, and no honest-to-goodness Passat wagon either, even though the Alltrack is only 1.2 inches higher than the regular wagon.

While other VWs may get an expressive fascia, the new Passat is pure conservative VW. From the geometric grille to the character line that’s as flat as Kansas, the Passat never strikes a pose that would offend a conservative mid-size shopper. If you want a VW with more excitement or Euro flair, the CC brings more aggressive bumpers, more chrome and sexier tail lights to the party. While some in the press have called the Passat boring, I would posit the sedate lines will help the Passat age more gracefully than some of the competition, most notably the new Sonata.

Those of us that seriously considered the previous generation Passat when purchasing a near-luxury vehicle like an Acura or Volvo (myself included) will be disappointed with the interior. The new Passat is now $8,000 cheaper than the previous car, and it’s re-positioning as a mid-size, rather than near-luxury car meant that something had to give. Mid-size shoppers demand expansive rather than expensive cabins, and VW took note. Camcord shoppers also place fuel economy, electronic doodads and rear-seat leg room higher on their list than squishy dash bits.  As a result, the new Passat is as mainstream as any, with parts quality a notch below the outgoing model but easily on par with Ford’s Fusion and the new Camry, right down to the fake wood on the dash.

The lack of real tree is just one of the changes that VW made to pull the Passat out of the near-luxury market. Now missing at any trim level are  HID headlamps, optional AWD (although the rumor mill says it may be available later), the turbo four-cylinder engine, a station wagon variant, backup camera, rain sensing wipers, rear seat HVAC vents and a few other items that the VWVortex crowd feels are essential for a Passat. All this really means to the shopper is that the Passat is finally aimed squarely at Camry and Accord shoppers who don’t buy those sorts of options anway. Perhaps because of VW’s reliability numbers in past years the one standard feature VW didn’t remove is their 3 year/36,000 mile scheduled maintenance included on every Passat.

Fitting in with the rest of the class, VW fitted a 2.5 liter naturally aspirated base engine under the hood. Unlike the competition, the Passat’s engine sports a 5-cylinder design. The five-banger is smoother than the competition’s base engines and the average shopper won’t notice (or won’t care about) the odd cylinder count. Channeling the 170HP and 177lb-ft of torque to the front wheels is a standard 6-speed automatic (SE models have a manual option while TDI and V6 models get a 6-speed DSG). 2.5 shoppers aren’t likely to get hot and bothered for a DSG either, as long as they don’t have to work a clutch and gearshifter, and the combination delivers 22MPG city and 31MPG highway according to the EPA. Over our 480 miles with the Passat we averaged a respectable 28.5MPG in mixed driving with highway runs easily hitting the advertised 31MPG.

The Passat’s longer wheelbase (up 3.7 inches from 2010) pays dividends with a smoother highway ride, but notably less poise in the corners compared to the old model. While the tuning of the suspension may be slightly softer than before, much of the difference comes down to a rubber change. The outgoing model wore fairly wide (for a mass-market car) 235/45R17 shoes while the new Passat slips on svelte 215/55R17s. I like my tires wide,but this change brings the Passat in line with the Camry, Acrcord and Mazda 6 which all wear 215-width rubber on comparable models. Aiding the Passat’s agility, which I subjectively place somewhere between a Camry and a Mazda 6, is a fairly light 3,221lb curb weight.

As Ford has shown with their SYNC product, volume car shoppers want technology. VW has unfortunately decided that your level of infotainment tech directly relates to a trim level. While it is possible to upgrade some of these items after you drive off the lot, it’s far easier if you know what you want going in. Base models have standard Bluetooth integration with streaming audio, an auxiliary input jack and 9 speakers. Jumping up to the SE trim may get you a touch-screen interface and Sirius satellite radio but if iPod love is what you’re after you’ll only find that in the “SE with Sunroof and Navigation” or higher trims. The top-of-the-line SEL model will get you 400 watts of Fender amplification, and a subwoofer that’s tuned toward the “boomy” side of the baseline.

The base infotainment system, dubbed “RNS315″  gives you a 5 inch medium-resolution (400×240) touchscreen display, a single CD player and Sirius satellite radio. Stepping up to the SEL we tested gets you the “RNS 510” which is a 6.5 inch high-resolution (800×480) touchscreen system with a single slot DVD player and 45GB of hard drive storage split between maps (15GB) and personal music storage (25GB). The 510 is also capable of displaying live traffic data as well as “Sirius Travel Link” fuel prices, ski info, sports scores, weather forecasts and movie listings. While most of the information is superfluous, the fuel pricing is handy, especially if you opt for a diesel Passat as locating a diesel station can be tricky at times. The traffic and Travel Link features require a Sirius subscription and VW tosses in a 6-month trial for free. While I normally think the live traffic feature is worth the cost, VW has relegated traffic displays to a single map view rather than overlaying the information on all map views as most other manufacturers do so you might just skip the service if you have a smartphone and Google maps.

Now to the nitty-gritty. In 2011 the average vehicle sold in the US left the dealer show room for just under $30,000 before taxes. Since VW is aiming straight at the mainstream it should be no surprise that our SEL tester rang in at $28,395 (not including a $770 destination charge). Based on my research, the Passat compares well with the Camry and Accord but the Hyundai Sonata enjoys a pricing and feature advantage over the VW, while also possessing more radical styling and a Hyundai badge. My local VW dealer wouldn’t give me any firm numbers, but indicated the “2.5 SE with Sunroof” ($25,625) and “2.5 SE with Sunroof and Navigation” ($26,795) were their top selling Passat models.

Last time I new-car-shopped I was torn between the Lexus IS350, a Passat 3.6 4Motion and a Volvo S60R. While the R got the final nod, this speaks to the market position the former Passat held. This position seems to be the hardest thing for VW lovers, VW shoppers and the automotive press to let go of. This Passat is no longer a Volvo/Acura competitor. Instead, it’s exactly what the American shoppers asked for: a grown up Jetta. As painful as this may be to hear, it’s good for VW, and it’s good for the Camcord shopper looking for something different. For the shopper looking to replace their 2007 Passat with a new VW or the forum fanoy that’s broken hearted VW has “ruined” the Passat, get over it. Your Passat is the Volkswagen CC.

Volkswagen provided the vehicle, insurance and one tank of gas for this review.

Specifications as tested

0-30:3 seconds

0-60: 8.9 seconds

1/4 mile: 16.9 @ 82.9MPH

Observed fuel economy: 28.5MPG over 480 miles